By JOSEPH KELLARD
"I'm so sorry for everything," Ceber, 43, said moments before Nassau County Court Judge David Sullivan sentenced him for second-degree murder on Feb. 16. "I love her so much. Every day I remember her and miss her."
An illegal Turkish immigrant who lived in Deer Park, Ceber used kitchen knives to stab Violet Karagiannis more than 20 times in the chest, stomach and back, in the bedroom of her Lorraine Avenue home on the night of May 29, 2006.
Jennifer, Karagiannis's adult daughter who lived with her, cried to Ceber at the sentencing, "Are you happy now? Every day I think about her, and I have to think about how you killed her."
Ceber pleaded guilty to the crime before his case was scheduled to go to trial last month. If his case had gone to trial and he were convicted, he would have faced 40-years-to-life in prison, and he could have faced another 15 years for robbery.
His lawyer, Brian Carmody of Westbury, told the Herald, "I¹ve never met a client who had such immediate and total remorse ... And he told me he wasn¹t going to go to trial. If you confess and show immediate remorse, that¹s a real positive for when you come to parole."
Prosecutors described the evidence against Ceber as "overwhelming" -- the most damning being his written and videotaped confession and bloody clothes that he gave to police.
After he murdered Karagiannis, 54, and fled her home, Ceber called his friend, Jodie Torrez, a Suffolk County resident and told him what he had done, Carmody said. "She told him he has to turn himself in and he did," said Carmody, who described Torrez as Ceber¹s devoted friend who was prepared to testify against him for the prosecution.
After Carmody went home and changed, he turned himself in at a Deer Park 7-Eleven, where a police officer was parked eating in his patrol car. "The cop didn¹t believe him because he didn¹t have any blood on him," Carmody said. "He took the police to his house and showed him his bloody clothes."
Later that night, Jennifer, 29, came home and went to sleep, unaware that her mother lay dead in her bedroom. Police woke her up after Ceber told them about the incident, found the victim fully clothed in her bed and pronounced her dead at the scene.
Ceber was arrested and charged with second-degree murder and first-degree burglary, but pleaded not guilty to the charges in First District Court in Hempstead on May 30.
Ceber and Karagiannis had dated for about two years when she ended the relationship a few months before her murder. After their breakup, Ceber continued to pursue Karagiannis, following her and calling her -- in some cases nearly 50 times a day.
Karagiannis never called police or sought an order of protection against Ceber. The day of her murder, he called her home and begged Jennifer to let him talk to her, but she warned him she would call police if he didn't leave her mother alone. Later that night, Ceber and Karagiannis ran into each other at Coyote Grill, an Island Park restaurant and bar they sometimes went to together. Karagiannis, who was with friends, told Ceber "in no uncertain terms to leave her alone," detectives said.
When Karagiannis and her friends left the restaurant and stopped briefly at a local Taco Bell, Ceber drove to her home and entered using the key she had given him when they were dating. He cut her phone lines, hid in her bedroom closet and, when she arrived, immediately attacked her, using two of her own carving knives in the stabbing, according to prosecutors.
Larella Reiter, the victim's neighbor, described her as "a very nice person" who "just worked, worked, worked." Karagiannis was a real estate agent for Sea Coast Realty in Island Park for eight years. Another neighbor, Doris Andriano, described Karagiannis as "a sweetheart" who "kept very much to herself."
Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 287.
